Union keeps nursery pay campaign national

Published on Sunday 29 February 2004 00:00

UNION leaders yesterday insisted they would fight on for a national deal on nursery nurses’ pay, despite the latest local settlements between staff and council bosses.

East Renfrewshire and Falkirk councils announced on Friday that their nursery classes would not be affected by this week’s all-out national strike after deals were reached with staff.

With eight councils now having secured agreement, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla) called on public sector union Unison to help thrash out deals in the remaining 24 areas.

But Unison’s Scottish local government organiser Joe Di Paola yesterday insisted that 90% of nursery nurses would begin indefinite strike action across the country tomorrow as planned.

Cosla president Pat Watters said: "This is the only way this dispute can be settled and the ones who are holding the keys to local settlements are Unison."

But up to 5,000 staff would be involved in the action, Di Paola said, culminating in a national march and rally in Glasgow on Friday.

He added: "Cosla were quite happy to deal with this nationally when they thought nursery nurses would accept what they were offering.

"But when it was rejected they moved the goalposts back to local settlements which is now the same old tired record they keep repeating."

Nursery nurses’ pay has not been reviewed for nearly 16 years and most basic-grade nursery nurses earn 10,000 a year at the beginning of their career - moving up to 13,800 after 10 years service, according to Unison.

The union wants a rise in this basic grade to between 14,000 and 18,000.

Di Paola said some councils may be "panicking" in view of impending action, and settling at a higher level than Cosla had suggested.

But he insisted that differential rates of pay were unfair and could even lead to the sort of recruitment and retention problems faced in social work departments.

"From a Scottish perspective, nursery nurses, by and large, do the same job and it simply makes no sense to have 32 rates of pay," he said.

Parents and children across Scotland are facing potential chaos after nursery nurses voted by 81% to take indefinite strike action over pay.

The vote moves the campaign of one-off strikes, which have been taking place over the past 10 months, on to a much more serious footing.

Nurseries across Scotland could now be closed from March, with parents being forced to make alternative childcare arrangements. Those children who are due to start school in August will be particularly hit because they will miss out on vital preparation work.

There have also been concerns that youngsters with special educational needs will be badly affected, although unions have pledged that no vulnerable children will be adversely hit.

Councils have felt particularly aggrieved at recent claims that they have given up on negotiations and undervalue their staff.

They admit their handling of the dispute in the press may have been "too subtle and measured" to be effective.

They are hoping a new strategy will try to knock down many of Unison’s claims and stress the desirability of local pay negotiations.

However a private briefing paper discussed by Cosla representatives has raised the possible need for an across-the-board pay agreement.